What is biodiversity?

Biodiversity (or biological diversity) is a collective term meaning: the totality and variety of life on Earth. Biodiversity includes genetic diversity within species; the variety among species; and the range of ecosystems within which life exists and interacts.

Seventy per cent of the world’s species is found in just 12 countries: Australia, Brazil, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, India, Indonesia, Madagascar, Mexico, Peru and Democratic Republic of Congo. The entire Hindu Kush-Himalayan belt has as many as 25,000 plant species, comprising 10 per cent of the world’s flora...